Matt Mullican

Matt Mullican was trained as an artist in California, studying at Cal Arts, before moving to New York City. Mullican is considered one of the core members of the founders of the "Pictures" group of artists. These artists supplanted the language-based work of their predecessors with the use of found images and a renewed interest in pictorial language, often in the guise of systems and structures. Tied to philosophical and linguistic currents no less than their forebears, artists like Mullican developed languages simulating cyber-code, and supplanted elemental cosmologies for other forms of the sign. In the 1970s, Mullican began to experiment with hypnosis and parallel states, utilizing his own body to create psychological environments and staged events, no less complex than the orders he created with painting. His elemental forms, often seeming like hallucinogenic outgrowths of Vitruvius, and his compacted but rhythmic use of color, have established a macro-practice that rivals the work of artists such as Sol LeWitt. And in fact, the young artist Mullican was intimately familiar with the work of "systems" artists such as LeWitt, and even executed wall drawings for the elder artist. Mullican's work is characterized by the same brilliant fusion of material and support.

Born in 1951 in Santa Monica, USA
Lives and works in Berlin, Germany, and New York, USA

Matt Mullican’s works have been shown in recent years at the Haus der Kunst, Munich (2011), Metropolitan Museum (2009), Biennale Sao Paulo (2008), ICA, Philadelphia (2008), ; Museion, Bolzano (2006), Museum Ludwig in Cologne (2006) and Lentos Museum, Linz (2005). He has been exhibited in several editions of Documenta.